which neatly segues me into my first story this week of my old muckas ranulph fiennes and rory coleman, who are currently making the gruelling journey across 150 miles of sand, for the marathon des sables, and at 71 ran is just an amazing human being to attempt to run what is heralded as the worlds toughest footrace, and is also raising dollar for marie curie, so here is a video of today's part of their epic adventure, have a look and if you feel so inclined to donate, ran's efforts will not have been in vain.

what inspiring geezers, and i am very proud to have rory as my coach for my race to the stones, and if anybody can get me to run a 100k in one day it is rory.

i am as you may have guessed still here after running the longest distance of my life last week, and as per my training schedule i did a 15 mile run thursday, and then should have done a 20 mile run, pushing myself further than ever before on friday.

however, i committed a couple of rookie errors.

firstly, rather than run on a flat tarmac road, which i have been doing thus far, i chose to go to the black mountains which has hundreds of metres of ascent, plus is extremely boggy at this time of year, which is extremely energy sapping as you literally run through mud and water up past your ankles.

second pants idea was to invite my old climbing buddy from my alaskan trip 'denali jane' who is like a goat on speed, and is so fast it is unbelievable, but where she excelled in speed, she struggled with navigation skills, and we ended up running and walking 22.4 miles which took over five and a half hours as we got lost!

not ideal conditions, but the next day my recovery was great, and i genuinely can't wait to up my mileage, and talk to rory when they return next week for more inspiration.

before they left for the race rory did tell me that ran just doesn't have an 'off' switch, so i am going to hope that his tenacity and drive get him to the finish line, and when it does this will be another great story i look forward to hearing him tell.

my birthday 2012 with the ledge, note sawn off fingers on left hand!

this kind of reminds me of a saying that actress daughter tiffany told me her flatmate rachel said recently, when discussing their attempts to gain success in their careers, to which she said to tiffany 'i run with winners' which i don't know if she made up, but i love, and i feel the same way, mediocrity doesn't thrill me, i love to surround myself with winners and equivalents thereof.

it reminded me of my early career playing ice hockey, where, aged 10 i would stand in my bedroom with my ice hockey catching glove containing a tennis ball on my left hand, and a tennis racket in my right.

i would toss the ball up in the air, and 'thwack', hit it against the wall, only to catch it in my glove, and repeat the process, hitting the ball harder and faster, pushing my reflexes to screaming intensity, time after time, after time, making sure that the curtains were closed to stop the glass from smashing if i missed the catch.

and oh i missed the catch, many many times i missed the catch, but over the hours and days, and weeks, and months, and seasons, i improved, and grew stronger and faster, until i was able to forge a career doing what i had always loved doing, and countless times the fan of the opposing team who had just lost at home, would approach me in the bar of the musty old rink, with sticky mauve carpet, and brown carpet burns, 'hey smiffy, you were lucky out there tonight', and i would just smile, and never speak, you my friend have egg from your dinner down your shirt, and you speak of my luck, you do not know me, you do not know how hard hard i work, and always have, to enjoy the sweet taste of success, the taste i adore, the taste that satiates me, like blood to a vampire, and the successful teams i have played on have all included equally driven people, and throughout my life i have gravitated toward these kind of people, and as i watch them climb mountains as i type, and run races in the desert, i realise that like rachel 'i run with winners'.

that got a bit deep didn't it, sorry about that!! :)

well to lighten things up a bit, i just wanna say a huge thanks to the mystery person who gave me a shed load of easter eggs to give to ty gwyn special school, superkind gesture, cheers chum.

bigup to this weeks new subscribers, welcome, i hope you enjoy the journey.

and.......drum roll please, a great big welcome to craig and aimee from 'kinging it' (not to be confused with kinger who's running up kili)

now 'kinging it' needs to be explained a bit more, so here's a link, check these guys out they are rockstars, and they have connected with bigmoose, and are going to be playing a big part in some future bigmoose stuff from around the world, i am genuinely excited with the energy i think they will bring to bigmoose, so watch this space, and after you've checked out a couple of their adventures you will be saying their catchphrase, it's infectious 'kinging it' 'rule your own world'

i have some stuff coming up in the next 48 hours that will hopefully see us hit 25 bigmoose runners in the cardiff half marathon if you fancy joining us, and also having a chinwag with a young lady i met on facebook who wants to swim the channel for bigmoose, how amazingly cool, so check out our social media feeds, on fb twitter and insta and tell your friends about us if you can, the more you help spread the word about us the more we grow, the more we grow the more good we do, so just get one person more to follow us this week, and the compound effect will be amazing, thanks,

so until next week, i'll be seeing ya,

blue skies,

jeffers

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